Cavern filled below site of new parking lot

17 trucks of concrete needed at Wilson school, which is otherwise on schedule.

October 07, 2009|By Christopher Baxter OF THE MORNING CALL

Contractors for the Wilson Area School District recently discovered a cavern below the site of a parking lot for the new intermediate school, and said Monday they would test the grounds to locate any other holes.

During construction for a new stormwater pipe, one of the site excavators broke through the limestone bedrock and revealed the cavern, said James Lynch, engineer with D'Huy Engineering.

At the school board meeting Monday, Lynch showed a video of a worker descending down a ladder through the 10- to 15-foot diameter hole into the cavern, likely carved out over time by groundwater.

"These are common occurrences considering the kind of rock we find here," Lynch said.

Workers filled the hole Friday with 17 trucks of concrete, he said, and planned to do additional tests around the grounds to determine if any other holes exist.

Wilson Superintendent Doug Wagner said an estimate for the concrete fill would probably be presented as a change order at the next board meeting.

Besides the cavern, construction on the roughly $37 million renovation of the middle school was proceeding on schedule, said Josh Grice, another engineer with D'Huy.

Wagner said classes in the existing portions of the middle school were continuing with few interruptions, mostly noise.